place of the aria we have the _logos_. This is the musical
expression of the principal passion underlying the action of the drama.
Whenever, in the course of the development of the story, this passion
comes into ascendency, the rich strains of the _logos_ are heard anew,
stilling all other sounds. Gounod has, in part, applied this principle
in "Faust." All opera-goers will remember the intense dramatic effect
arising from the recurrence of the same exquisite lyric outburst from
the lips of Marguerite.

The peculiar character of Wagner's word-drama next arouses critical
interest and attention. The composer is his own poet, and his creative
genius shines no less here than in the world of tone. The musical energy
flows entirely from the dramatic conditions, like the electrical current
from the cups of the battery; and the rhythmical structure of the
_melos_ (tune) is simply the transfiguration of the poetical basis. The
poetry, then, is all-important in the music-drama. Wagner has rejected
the forms of blank verse and rhyme as utterly unsuited to the lofty
purposes of music, and has gone to the metrical principle of all the
Teutonic and Slavonic poetry. This rhythmic element of alliteration,
or _staffrhyme_, we find magnificently illustrated in the Scandinavian
Eddas, and even in our own Anglo-Saxon fragments of the days of Caedmon
and Alcuin. By the use of this new form, verse and melody glide together
in one exquisite rhythm, in which it seems impossible to separate the
one from the other. The strong accents of the alliterating syllables
supply the music with firmness, while the low-toned syllables give
opportunity for the most varied _nuances_ of declamation.

The first radical development of Wagner's theories we see in "The Flying
Dutchman." In "Tanhhaeser" and "Lohengrin" they find full sway. The utter
revolt of his mind from the trivial and commonplace sentimentalities of
Italian opera led him to believe that the most heroic and lofty motives
alone should furnish the dramatic foundation of opera. For a while he
oscillated between history and legend, as best adapted to furnish his
material. In his selection of the dream-land of myth and legend, we
may detect another example of the profound and _exigeant_ art-instincts
which have ruled the whole of Wagner's life. There could be no question
as to the utter incongruity of any dramatic picture of ordinary events,
or ordinary personages, finding expression in musical utte